"No'm," he answered truthfully, "it hardly hurts at all."
And having followed her to the bathroom, he insisted, with unusual gentleness, that he be left to apply the arnica to the alleged injuries himself. He was so persuasive that she yielded, and descended to the library, where she found her husband once more at home after his day's work.
"Well?" he said. "Did Georgie show up, and were they decent to him?"
"Oh, yes; it's all right. Sam and Penrod were good as gold. I saw them being actually cordial to him."
"That's well," Mr. Williams said, settling into a chair with his paper. "I was a little apprehensive, but I suppose I was mistaken. I walked home, and just now, as I passed Mrs.
Bassett's, I saw Doctor Venny's car in front, and that barber from the corner shop on Second Street was going in the door. I couldn't think what a widow would need a barber and a doctor for--especially at the same time. I couldn't think what Georgie'd need such a combination for either, and then I got afraid that maybe--"
Mrs. Williams laughed. "Oh, no; it hasn't anything to do with his having been over here. I'm sure they were very nice to him."
"Well, I'm glad of that."
"Yes, indeed--" Mrs. Williams began, when Fanny appeared, summoning her to the telephone.
It is pathetically true that Mrs. Williams went to the telephone humming a little song. She was detained at the instrument not more than five minutes; then she made a plunging return into the library, a blanched and stricken woman. She made strange, sinister gestures at her husband.
He sprang up, miserably prophetic. "Mrs. Bassett?"
"Go to the telephone," Mrs. Williams said hoarsely "She wants to talk to you, too. She CAN'T talk much--she's hysterical. She says they lured Georgie into the cellar and had him beaten by negroes!
That's not all--"
Mr. Williams was already on his way.
"You find Sam!" he commanded, over his shoulder.
Mrs. Williams stepped into the front hall. "Sam!" she called, addressing the upper reaches of the stairway. "Sam!"
Not even echo answered.
"SAM!"
A faint clearing of somebody's throat was heard behind her, a sound so modest and unobtrusive it was no more than just audible, and, turning, the mother beheld her son sitting upon the floor in the shadow of the stairs and gazing meditatively at the hatrack.
His manner indicated that he wished to produce the impression that he had been sitting there, in this somewhat unusual place and occupation, for a considerable time, but without overhearing anything that went on in the library so close by.
"Sam," she cried, "what have you DONE?"
"Well--I guess my legs are all right," he said gently. "I got the arnica on, so probably they won't hurt any m--"
"Stand up!" she said.
"Ma'am?"
"March into the library!"
Sam marched--slow-time. In fact, no funeral march has been composed in a time so slow as to suit this march of Sam's. One might have suspected that he was in a state of apprehension.
Mr. Williams entered at one door as his son crossed the threshold of the other, and this encounter was a piteous sight. After one glance at his father's face, Sam turned desperately, as if to flee outright. But Mrs. Williams stood in the doorway behind him.
"You come here!" And the father's voice was as terrible as his face. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO GEORGIE BASSETT?"
"Nothin'," Sam gulped; "nothin' at all."
"What!"
"We just--we just 'nishiated him."
Mr. Williams turned abruptly, walked to the fireplace, and there turned again, facing the wretched Sam. "That's all you did?"
"Yes, sir."
"Georgie Bassett's mother has just told me over the telephone,"
Mr. Williams said, deliberately, "that you and Penrod Schofield and Roderick Bitts and Maurice Levy LURED GEORGIE INTO THE CELLAR AND HAD HIM BEATEN BY NEGROES!"
At this, Sam was able to hold up his head a little and to summon a rather feeble indignation.
"It ain't so," he declared. "We didn't any such thing lower him into the cellar. We weren't goin' NEAR the cellar with him. We never THOUGHT of goin' down cellar. He went down there himself, first."
"So! I suppose he was running away from you, poor thing! Trying to escape from you, wasn't he?"
"He wasn't," Sam said doggedly. "We weren't chasin' him--or anything at all."
"Then why did he go in the cellar?"
"Well, he didn't exactly GO in the cellar," Sam said reluctantly.
"Well, how did he GET in the cellar, then?"
"He--he fell in," said Sam.
"HOW did he fall in?"
"Well, the door was open, and--well, he kept walkin' around there, and we hollered at him to keep away, but just then he kind of--well, the first _I_ noticed was I couldn't SEE him, and so we went and looked down the steps, and he was sitting down there on the bottom step and kind of shouting, and--"
"See here!" Mr. Williams interrupted. "You're going to make a clean breast of this whole affair and take the consequences.
You're going to tell it and tell it ALL. Do you understand that?"
"Yes, sir."
"Then you tell me how Georgie Bassett fell down the cellar steps--and tell me quick!"
"He--he was blindfolded."
"Aha! NOW we're getting at it. You begin at the beginning and tell me just what you did to him from the time he got here.
Understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"Go on, then!"
"Well, I'm goin' to," Sam protested. "We never hurt him at all.
He wasn't even hurt when he fell down cellar. There's a lot of mud down there, because the cellar door leaks, and--"
"Sam!" Mr. Williams's tone was deadly. "Did you hear me tell you to begin at the beginning?"
Sam made a great effort and was able to obey.
